Indian IT Industry

[KJo]

I feel sad when Modi has to call the Australian PM and beg for work visas. WTF man? Don't we have any pride? Why are we begging the white man to throw us some crumbs? Foreign leaders have NO RESPONSIBILITY to care about Indian IT workers. Many Indians seem to forget this. Trump does not and should not care about non-American citizens. He should do what is good for the US. The sooner we realize this the better. Pakis are even worse off than us on this.

Narendra Modi raises 457 work visa row in telephonic conversation with Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull
http://www.india.com/news/india/narendr ... l-2091287/

You are looking at it from an Australian and immigration PoV, but there is a far simpler explanation. WTO commitments. Work visas are covered under labour movement clauses toward free trade, so Aus is bound by its commitments. That's also why if Trump revokes H1-B, India can take the US to the WTO tribunal. It is a trade issue. Keeping this in mind, what Modi did was normal and expected. Expect Nirmala Sitaraman to follow up on this - it comes under her ministry's ambit, and not MEA.

As for the immigration option, that's up to the host country and its laws. No one asked the US or Australia to provide a path for residency, they could be like the Gulf states. You'll notice GoI has never commented on GC, priority dates, etc., that would be begging for jobs.

How will we feel if President of Islamic Republic of Timbucktooistan calls up Modi and demands him not to abrogate Art 370?

Really? That's your equivalence?

Why not? It seems like we are telling Australia how to do business. They won't brook any interference in their affairs outside of the usual smiles and laughs just like we won't allow UN, Cheen or anyone else decide how we do things.

The only reason to call TBull or Trump is if they are violating an agreement. If that is the case, then I agree with the call.

[pgbhat]

Sadly even I have attended calls at 11:00 PM - 1:00 AM range since it is right time in EST/PST but unfortunately there is no running away from it as much as you hate it. It is like one of those things which like death and taxes are permanent in life.
Everyone in the ecosystem assumes that we in India dont have any life in the evening and can be called for call anytime especially the desi bosses in USA.

While I am typing this post, I am sitting in a stupid call waiting for the call to get over to have my dinner.

Most Indians have a problem of saying no to superiors and drawing boundaries. There is element of fear in not saying yes: you can end up getting a bad appraisal or worse fired. There is more to life than just work (IMHO even if that is ones passion). My last job at a startup (bought by chacha eventually) burned me out heavily. I quit and moved to a larger company and openly stated no late night calls. I no longer login past 5:00 PM unless all hell has broken loose. Have not configured e-mails in my phone and have deliberately not opted for company phone. I do not waste a minute in office doing personal stuff or chatting with colleagues for things other than work related stuff.

[arshyam]

Why not? It seems like we are telling Australia how to do business. They won't brook any interference in their affairs outside of the usual smiles and laughs just like we won't allow UN, Cheen or anyone else decide how we do things.

The only reason to call TBull or Trump is if they are violating an agreement. If that is the case, then I agree with the call.

'Cos it is a false equivalence. Modi is not telling the Aussie PM to give GC or citizenship, nor is he telling him to allow Hindu temples and hyooman rights - the reverse of course happens all the time from every don, dick and barry . Basically, when signing up to WTO, a country agrees to a level of openness in trade and defines it in specifics, so if they go back on it they can be questioned. As simple as that. It's not interference, per se.

Do you remember Ombaba calling on India to import Amriki solar panels, and being dragged to WTO for the same? We did lose that case, btw. I have no issue with his calling Modi for the solar panels, but do have an issue with his lecture to us on hyooman rights after dining at our table after Republic day. I hope you'll agree that there is a difference between these two.

[Santosh]

Santosh saar, who provides your matching algos, or are you developing those as well?

A company called Neurotec. They are based somewhere in Oirope I think.

[Gus]

issues can be raised for barriers for goods under WTO. it can also be raised for services (movement of people). It is not "interference"

[Singha]

goras are always going around begging india to buy soya , insurance and olive oil or china to buy chicken legs and pork.
its all trade. where in chicken legs , financial services or IT.

[KJo]

Sadly even I have attended calls at 11:00 PM - 1:00 AM range since it is right time in EST/PST but unfortunately there is no running away from it as much as you hate it. It is like one of those things which like death and taxes are permanent in life.
Everyone in the ecosystem assumes that we in India dont have any life in the evening and can be called for call anytime especially the desi bosses in USA.

While I am typing this post, I am sitting in a stupid call waiting for the call to get over to have my dinner.

Most Indians have a problem of saying no to superiors and drawing boundaries. There is element of fear in not saying yes: you can end up getting a bad appraisal or worse fired. There is more to life than just work (IMHO even if that is ones passion). My last job at a startup (bought by chacha eventually) burned me out heavily. I quit and moved to a larger company and openly stated no late night calls. I no longer login past 5:00 PM unless all hell has broken loose. Have not configured e-mails in my phone and have deliberately not opted for company phone. I do not waste a minute in office doing personal stuff or chatting with colleagues for things other than work related stuff.

In India we have a bullying culture among ourselves. The stronger guy bullies the weaker one. If you go to a Govt office like RTO, the clerk bullies you. "Come after 3", "come Monday" are what I would hear every time I visited. Everything is so arbitrary. You would see the next guy walk in and have his work done. I have not worked in India but I am told many managers behave the same way with their team while licking the boots of their goras bosses from Amreeka. "yes Steve" "no problem Bob", "I will get this done by Monday, John".

The root of this is probably our low self-esteem as a people.

10 years ago, I would talk to friends and relatives working in India and they would tell me with pride how they work "16 hours a day". So I said wow, some hot startup? Some world changing project? No. Doing Bank of Amreeka back-office work for INFY/TCS. My cousin told me I would not be able to survive the work life in India hinting that we Amreeka residents were lazy.

The culture in India of working insane hours and "giving up one's life for company" needs to go. People need to have work hours that allow them time with their spouses and children. I used to see postings on FB applauding some bank employee who supposedly spent 40 years there and never took a day off. When his mother died, he did the rituals and came back to office.

We need to re-prioritize our lives. Life is a journey, not a destination. We should not wake up at 60 and realize that life passed by and all we did was go to work.

I think there are positive improvements already happening.

[KJo]

goras are always going around begging india to buy soya , insurance and olive oil or china to buy chicken legs and pork.
its all trade. where in chicken legs , financial services or IT.

It's slightly different here.
A salesman goes to a client and shows him how he can help get his work done cheaper and quicker.
We have already done it with our IT industry. Years ago.

Modi was asking them to remove visa restrictions so that more Indians can get jobs. He was not selling a new product/service or telling the customer (Aus/US) something they did not already know. No one will do us any favors in international trade.

[Singha]

your broken record continues...

[arshyam]

Seriously, getting boring beyond a point. I suppose one should be thankful that terms like "infestation" are missing. Small mercies.

[KJo]

your broken record continues...

I just answered because you replied referencing to my earlier post.

[Gus]

Modi was asking them to remove visa restrictions so that more Indians can get jobs. He was not selling a new product/service or telling the customer (Aus/US) something they did not already know. No one will do us any favors in international trade.

Can you at least TRY to understand what multiple people are saying here?

There is really no difference between a govt putting up barriers in the form of import duties and a govt putting up visa restrictions to restrict movement of people offering services.

Under WTO both are issues that one signatory country can raise with another.

Is it such a hard concept to understand?

[Marten]

Santosh saar, who provides your matching algos, or are you developing those as well?

A company called Neurotec. They are based somewhere in Oirope I think.

Know them well. They worked with Accenture for the UID demo.

[Javee]

Why so much takleef on Indian service providers? If "peechakaro" wants to reduce their IT budget by 40% and YoY cost reduction starting from 40% all the way to 60-70% in 3-5 years, this is what they will get. Indian service providers have mastered the art of ASM/AD that even the other MNC's started their offshore GDC's in India, following the same model as the much maligned TCS/Infy/Wipro. You got to ask yourselves, why do these companies open up GDC's in India, if the quality of Indian labor is as poor as you claim? It is the same as "Made in China"; you get a top notch merchandise or a dodgy merchandise depending on your ability to pay. We all hear how poor the Chinese merchandise is, yet you see them all over the world, ever wondered why? The same was true for Japanese and Korean products. It is demand supply and the control is firmly with the buyer and not the seller.

[Singha]

In the end all trade is about jobs. People who produce pork soya olives cars planes all need a market for their output as do people who offer services whether onsite or remote.

Hindrances to trade come in all forms incl work visa issues. The total amt of global services industry trade must be nearly matching that of merchandise trade.

[Neshant]

Modi was asking them to remove visa restrictions so that more Indians can get jobs. He was not selling a new product/service or telling the customer (Aus/US) something they did not already know. No one will do us any favors in international trade.

Can you at least TRY to understand what multiple people are saying here?

There is really no difference between a govt putting up barriers in the form of import duties and a govt putting up visa restrictions to restrict movement of people offering services.

Under WTO both are issues that one signatory country can raise with another.

Is it such a hard concept to understand?

Not sure i understand.

Are you saying anyone can come into a country and work a job (in that country?).

If so then what is the purpose of a country and its borders if its a free for all.

If Bangladeshis flood over the border and start taking jobs in India, surely it cannot be against WTO to stop them.

They could claim any visa restriction on them is a violation of WTO.

I don't know where the line is drawn. But I imagine it is drawn somewhere.

Now if a person comes in on a Business visa and solicits business with the job being done in India, that's a different situation.

There is no restriction on that. Frankly I don't think there is any way to prevent the export of that job.

But surely one country cannot demand visas any more than another country can demand their products be bought. But probably this kind of horse trading is what goes on behind the scenes as part of trade deals.

[Prasad]

Heh. Arbit clamping down on imports by using heavy handed anti dumping duties, import duties or banning imports from another country is the same as clamping down on free movement of labour. Not very hard to understand.

[Singha]

people use whatever sticks they have behind the scene to "open doors" in favour of their country. if that means country X needs to accept US made oranges at low tariff to get a easy deal on some IMF loan or a bunch of boeing planes its done quietly.

"rules" are just for the weak to follow.

US has the biggest sticks and carrots , and so mostly as a country they benefit from trade. but their Govt is also more likely to throw sections of people under the bus than a more 'socialist' setup like germany or japan.

thats the price one pays for living in the US/UK and not germany/japan - you get to keep more of the winnings but higher risk if things turn south.

[Neshant]

Heh. Arbit clamping down on imports by using heavy handed anti dumping duties, import duties or banning imports from another country is the same as clamping down on free movement of labour. Not very hard to understand.

There is no such thing as free movement of labor.

That is the reason borders and countries exist.

We're it not so, every Mexican, Pakistani, Indian, African..etc would be in the US looking for a job.

There is however outsourcing & offshoring.

[Zynda]

All along expected lines...

At least, this news will cheer up a few members on this board!

IT industry slows, Indian companies ready for large layoffs

BENGALURU/CHENNAI: Large IT services companies are all in the process of laying off employees on a scale not seen since the 2008-10 downturn. Those taking the hit first are mid and senior level professionals, those with 10 to 20 years of experience, but the expectation is that lower level employees too will be hurt later in the year, as growth in the $150-billion industry slows far more than anticipated and companies move towards hiring more in the US. The situation is worsening to a point where affected employees are beginning to approach labour unions to take up their cause. (One of the "conditions" of IT/ITES parks was no union kind of non-sense.)

Cognizant last week announced a voluntary separation programme for directors, associate VPs and senior VPs. Some 1,000 executives are expected to go. The company, one of the top performers in the industry, is expected to eventually cut at least 6,000 jobs+ , or 2.3% of its total workforce. Last Thursday, ten Cognizant employees, through the Forum for IT Employees, filed a petition with the assistant commissioner of labour arguing that they were being forced to sign voluntary resignation letters.

At Infosys, nearly 1,000 employees in job level 6 and above (group project managers, project managers, senior architects and higher levels) are expected to be asked to leave. Managers at these levels have been asked to identify, in terms of performance, the bottom 10% of their reportees.

Three weeks ago, Wipro + CEO Abid Ali Neemuchwala mentioned in an internal conference call that if revenues don't grow, around 10% of employees would be let go off this year. The product engineering team is likely to be one of the big casualties. Wipro ended the last fiscal year with 1.81 lakh employees.

French IT services major Capgemini is said to be letting go off nearly 9,000 people, or nearly 5% of its workforce. A large part of this are erstwhile employees of Igate, the company that Capgemini acquired in 2015. Capgemini had asked over 35 VP, SVPs, directors and senior directors to leave in February and 200 people were asked to leave at one of its offices in Mumbai.

As of March 31, Capgemini's total headcount was 195,800; 57%, or 111,300 employees, are in offshore centres, mostly in India.

Asked about the layoffs, Capgemini did not deny that some had been asked to leave, but said it expects to recruit over 20,000 new team members in India this year. "Each year our employees are evaluated based on strict performance criteria in an objective process, consistent with industry norms, to ensure we are aligned with our customer needs, business priorities, and the overall industry evolution. This leads naturally to a varying number of employees transitioning out of the organisation in any given year. We continue to accelerate our training programmes in 2017 with over 2,000 India employees having already undertaken upskilling and emerging technologies training alone," it said.

The slowdown in IT services is now palpable. Cognizant, which was growing at about 20%, expects to grow this year at only 8-10%. Infosys, which grew at 13.3% in constant currency in 2015-16, was down to 8.3% in the last fiscal and expects to grow only between 6.5% and 8.5% this year. TCS, which was growing in the teens, did just 8.3% last year.

Peter Bendor Samuel, CEO of IT consulting firm Everest Group, said the industry growth has slowed and the "arbitrage first" segment (traditional IT services) is in secular decline. "When this is added to the pyramid factory model which requires new freshers to be brought in every year to keep cost low, it results in an excess of more experienced employees," he said.


He thinks the most vulnerable employees are those with 3-7 years of experience. "Unfortunately, the new digital service economy is starting to further reduce the need for these employees. In many instances, the introduction of digital service models with extreme automation, can eliminate 40% or more of the FTEs (full time equivalent/employee) in a function. Finally, the new digital models require a lower proportion of FTEs offshore than the traditional arbitrage model and as these new service models take over, they will further stress the employment model," he said.

Tom Reuner, SVP of intelligent automation and IT services at IT consulting firm HfS, believes that employees have to incessantly re-invent themselves as the journey toward digital transformation necessitates new skill sets and continuous learning. "Many employees will struggle to make that journey. But equally, many service providers will struggle to adapt to these new realities. Skills will become more important than just scale," he said.

Ray Wang, CEO of Constellation Research, said cloud, artificial intelligence, and software platforms will lead to 20%-30% reduction of staffing by 2020.

[Singha]

actually other than a few cloud titans the global ITvity industry in general seems to be in secular decline from my readings on various forums.
stuff is being commoditized so its tough for even good product cos to make $$.

just like peak oil, perhaps we crossed peak itvity around 2008?

nobody wants to pay a dime. everyone esp SME and enterprises wants HW at rock bottom price and SW for free. neither do they want a 10 yr ownership cycle with AMC for hw and sw upgrades. they are looking to lease capacity on cloud and own nothing or lease their private IT farms on a pay as you go model with no minimum / very short minimum period of lockin and thereafter no penalties for just pulling the plug. people want to take advantage of faster hw and sw cycles via these lease and return models - get the next wave of cheaper and better stuff in 2 yrs.

FOSS gurus who can glue together a pipeline of 10 sw to get a enterprise workflow done on the cheap are valued. rest are shown the door.

things are so bad, some 20 + 20 lockers in my floor @ office were broken into at night back to back last week and lot of expensive optics of 10/40/100G stolen in a targeted way. must be a black market for these optics even in bluru. there was no CCTV in that area where our test team keeps personal stuff and these spare optics. so someone somewhere is looking to slash opex via blatant theft. more and more thefts are being reported in our labs as well. security team is at wits end how to catch the culprits.

[SRoy]

If desi MNC's think they can throw out people and re-orient organizational skills overnight they are mistaken.

I was just checking few offers (I have some relocation restrictions at the moment) and compensation gap between from such an offers vis-a-vis an equivalent experience level in desi IT MNC's is almost 6- 7 times.

So, how would desi MNC's fill up positions? They cannot hire expats given their salary demands and almost every techie (unless they have some constraint) would fly off aboard. Desi MNC's have brought this misery upon themselves.

It is true about FOSS. Yes in most cases they can cater to 70%-80% of enterprise needs.
But there again given the stranglehold of Oracle, IBM, MS, SAP, Amdocs etc. means, most desi IT guys involved in system integration work are not even familiar with these tools. My example is from Telecom, but I think it is even worse in other domains.

But have these cos learnt anything? No.
A cursory glance at my mailbox and I see requirements for "SAP Project Manager", "WebSphere Architect" etc.
So, either these companies are not adept at recruiting skilled people are they do not require skilled people at first place.

A common sensical approach would suggest that cost driver would lead to demand for products at local prices. So, field is open if you a good product which suits local wallets. Alas, desi MNC's are screwed here as well, as Western product companies have first mover advantage and they will simply release a XYZ-Lite version at throwaway prices and will be done with it.

[Yayavar]

so will new kids joining colleges opt for other courses now? MEch, Electrical, Civil, Electronics, etc. etc. get a boost or is the focus still on computer science and its close variants.

[SRoy]

^^

Electronics/Electrical techies are already best suited for IoT. So, that avenue is already there.
For other opportunities like AI or such like you need lots of CS folks.

So, I don't think enrollment for CS and ECS should drop down. It will be our loss if it happens.

IT companies need a basic structural change to make sure people get their to pursue their passion and interest and there should not be dearth of career growth for pure technical roles.

[Bart S]

^^

Electronics/Electrical techies are already best suited for IoT. So, that avenue is already there.
For other opportunities like AI or such like you need lots of CS folks.

Virtually all the IOT related employment opportunities are in software (especially big data and analytics) and systems integration (again heavily skewed towards software). The only electronics used by typical IOT deployments will be commoditized items mass-produced for throwaway prices in Shenzhen and Guangzhou.

[Santosh]

A company called Neurotec. They are based somewhere in Oirope I think.

Know them well. They worked with Accenture for the UID demo.

Marten saar, are you in same/similar field? I am R2I-ing to Mumbai next month for good. My company wants to explore sales opportunities in India and later open a development center if things go well. Let me know if you can provide any leads. You can email me at ssantosh71 at chacha.

[vivek_v]

FOSS gurus who can glue together a pipeline of 10 sw to get a enterprise workflow done on the cheap are valued. rest are shown the door.

I agree, especially for greenfield deployments. Also, More than the cost, the turnaround time with these FOSS tools is just remarkable.

If not for Android, I would have forgotten java maybe even 'C' . Keeping micro containers in Python or NodejS, frontend with Angular, patching everything together with messaging services like RabbitMQ or something with some nice distributed database, deployment of prototypes in Docker and finally Nginix load balancers satisfies 90% of your requirements with 10% of resource needs.

Additionally, they offer excellent decoupling, does not require for experience in J2EE and other complex miserable techniques, costly deployment webservers are not needed, unit testing and integration testing is easier, plus everyone can more or less work independently with no need of heavy project management.

^^

Electronics/Electrical techies are already best suited for IoT. So, that avenue is already there.
For other opportunities like AI or such like you need lots of CS folks.

So, I don't think enrollment for CS and ECS should drop down. It will be our loss if it happens.

IT companies need a basic structural change to make sure people get their to pursue their passion and interest and there should not be dearth of career growth for pure technical roles.

In the IOT field/electronics/related, unfortunately, Panda has a huge advantage. I was in Shenzen recently and cannot believe how easy it is to find any kind of electronics components, pcb assembly ..etc.

While embedded programmers (people who program in C and Firmware) are expensive when compared to India, its still faster compared to India from a logistic point of view to get hardware and maybe even firmware done in cheeni land rather than waiting for 2 weeks for one LCD to come to India via Alibaba (or even Digikey), get stuck in customs and finally spend another week trying to assemble the whole thing wasting 1 months in resources cost plus time in the process.

If you are in Shenzen, it is just the matter of driving to the company headquarters/factory and getting a few samples. This kind of turn around time is difficult to compete with in India.

Sad fact but its the truth.

[Singha]

well then the trick is to make import and export of such prototype low volume hw pieces really easy... there must be plenty of embedded design shops in japan/soko/taiwan/usa/germany who import produce from china. how do they manage?

[Vikas]

Is this Hai-toba about layoffs is because IT is in high visible area. After all laying of few thousand folks should be normal if your work force is around 2 Lakhs. Not everyone can be a great performer.
IT as in recruiting thousands of fresh college graduates and putting them in a billable role in some ODC is past its sell date.
In 3-4 years, I expect the big giants of Indian IT to be either changing directions big time or dying at a very fast pace.
Cloud and digitization would change everything.

[vivek_v]

well then the trick is to make import and export of such prototype low volume hw pieces really easy... there must be plenty of embedded design shops in japan/soko/taiwan/usa/germany who import produce from china. how do they manage?

Leaving exotic Chinese things (say a weird translator/bridge IC or LCD ) which you cannot get anywhere else, for major electronics parts, or even minor parts like a high precision resistor, DigiKey/Mouser order would be overnight shipping in USA while it takes more than a week for it even reach India customs from Singapore (nearest stock and shipping).

For PCB production, fine pitch BGA sockets (which you will need if you want to make anything small in IOT world) would need the PCB to made in Taiwan to get quality stuff (and 2X-3X cheaper than India for better quality). Assembly you can do it in India but it would still need 10 working days even when you get the highest priority slot in the assembly house for soldering.

To to just keep trying different RPT designs is again 10 days just for shipping from Panda since none of the 3D printers in India could get that finish, quality or precision which we need.

One does not have any of these issues if you are in Khan land, Panda or Taiwan.

To the best of my knowledge we do not make too many hardware stuff in Japan, Germany or Soko and hence I cannot comment on they manage. Note that, I am not even talking about the delays in Customs or the 30% duty on imported electric components since resources cost is anyway higher.

[SRoy]

Unfortunately true.

Few years ago, I made a minor modification to my old laptop. Swapped out the DVD writer with a SSD. The trick is to find a HD caddie that interfaces with the optical drives pin outs and also should be in exact dimension as the optical drive itself. The SSD just fits inside the HD caddie.

Guess what after searching for months I could locate that part with a Chinese manufacturer.

Having said that, IoT is too vast a field to left alone for the Chinese and there is no reason not to venture in it for high end concepts.

[vivek_v]

Unfortunately true.
............................
Having said that, IoT is too vast a field to left alone for the Chinese and there is no reason not to venture in it for high end concepts.

Roy Sir, we are in extremely high-end IOT design space. Again, what is IOT could be open for debate but this product involves hardware .

I am just saying the practical difficulties of doing this in India though I myself work in Algorithms and Cloud and not HW design.

[SRoy]

^^

Difficulties in India?

Which means if someone were to put up a venture that caters to Indian pricing would thrive? No?

[vivek_v]

^^

Difficulties in India?

Which means if someone were to put up a venture that caters to Indian pricing would thrive? No? Personally, nothing like driving to the local electronics market, picking up spares to put together your weekend project to begin with.
......................................

In difficulties, I meant the logistic issues (lead time) it takes to fix issues or iterate for the next improved design which adds to your time and cost.

Even in Indian pricing, you cannot beat China, since leaving the MCU (and maybe a few gold plated sensors), almost everything else is manufactured in China. Even MCU (for wearables and IOT space) and sensors are made in China for 1/5 the cost of competing silicon/sensors.

[Singha]

>DigiKey/Mouser order would be overnight shipping in USA

so khan and taiwan have local manufacture for IoT parts or they have large distributors who ship and pre-cache all parts from panda for local overnight shipping? how do they handle prototypes which need to be custom made - do they have local outfits doing that? once the protos are proven are they shipped off to panda for mass manufacture?

[vivek_v]

>DigiKey/Mouser order would be overnight shipping in USA

so khan and taiwan have local manufacture for IoT parts or they have large distributors who ship and pre-cache all parts from panda for local overnight shipping? how do they handle prototypes which need to be custom made - do they have local outfits doing that? once the protos are proven are they shipped off to panda for mass manufacture?

Nothing much is manufactured in Khan land expect some esoteric sensors to the best of my knowledge. Taiwan, on the other hand, is a different story and huge amount of high precision components is manufactured there. We even have a huge engineering office in Taiwan.

Regarding delivery, Khan land distributors stock almost everything you would need including some 0.00001% precision resistors/capacitors, all types of known MCU's, high precision opamp's, sensors ...etc. Taiwan is even better with even unknown (but good and really cheap) chinease MCU's and sensors available. Even if not available, you could get things in Taiwan in more or less in a day or two from the mainland.

Where Khan shines is in the availability of PCB fab houses (again Taiwan is better), assembly (again Taiwan is better), excellent places to make your RPT's/3D models...etc. While resources are technically much cheaper in desh, more or less better than our neighbors, for rapid prototyping in HW/IOT/Embedded space in turnaround time, it is difficult to beat Panda plus their neighbors. I would say they would be 2X-3X faster. Khan comes a close second and we would come last due to logistic issues

For production, everything including mold design (from RPT step files) is outsourced to the Pandas, where you give the Bill of Materials, design with assembly instructions, testing documents, simulators, and the factory would source everything including final packing boxes and ship it back to you. If we try to do the same in India (and we do manufacture in India), 90% of components are anyways imported from the land of the pandas.

Since pure SW does not need of this, we kind of shine in the same irrespective of what people might feel about desi IT shops and their engineer's ability in configuring webservers .

[Neshant]

Set up an electronics park/special industrial zone.

Duty free and accelerated imports and no taxes on all electronic components. No tax on any business designing electronics.

Unless the govt does this now, there is no hope of competing with any country.

India will be dead last in engineering.

[ManSingh]

Last time it took us a month to clear customs for the electronic components shipped. Reason was excise officer responsible for stpi which is an electronics park too could not be found at his desk. Items were cleared with verbal go ahead from divisional head.
And this is bangalore, hub of itvity. Absolutely a humiliating experience in front of end customer, every time we have to do this kind of transfer.
Who would want to take a risk for embedded, iot with such support.

[ManSingh]

Is this Hai-toba about layoffs is because IT is in high visible area. After all laying of few thousand folks should be normal if your work force is around 2 Lakhs. Not everyone can be a great performer.
IT as in recruiting thousands of fresh college graduates and putting them in a billable role in some ODC is past its sell date.
In 3-4 years, I expect the big giants of Indian IT to be either changing directions big time or dying at a very fast pace.
Cloud and digitization would change everything.

Actually industry managers and leads forgot that with an inflation of 10%, salaries would rise rapidly in India. With reduction in cost arbitrage, a proportional increase in talent capabilities was required. Apparently no one thought about that.
Now we have a situation wherein India is not simply cheap enough to justify offshoring at lower end of service offering. At higher end there is a drastic change in landscape with IOT, ai, machine learning etc. These are skills that simply can't be learnt overnight like java, c which propelled Indian outaourcing to the forefront.
We do not have a competitive university system that responds to changes in landscape fast enough.
People might agree/disagree with the importance of this but I have seen universities with courses in 2017 like 8051 microcontroller and exchange server 2008. Compare this to latest courses from georgia tech or texas univs. They have self driving cars, ai, data science, am335x and what not. Also GA tech has moved their masters in comp science program completely online and slashed cost to 7k usd besides increasing enrollment to thousands now. How the hell would we compete against such an offering.
It is time to wake up if someone is listening.

Apologies for the long rant.

[Marten]

Last time it took us a month to clear customs for the electronic components shipped. Reason was excise officer responsible for stpi which is an electronics park too could not be found at his desk. Items were cleared with verbal go ahead from divisional head.
And this is bangalore, hub of itvity. Absolutely a humiliating experience in front of end customer, every time we have to do this kind of transfer.
Who would want to take a risk for embedded, iot with such support.

You are not alone in this experience. The reason is plain and simple.

As for the GA course going online, isn't incentive to invite their HODs and see if we can interest them in a campus in India? All we need to do is find them the land (at the market cost) and offer tax incentives for the first five years. If the state govts get their acts together, a ten year plan with achievement goals/key research areas and some reasonable funding or the promise of support for the same would get something extraordinary going. Imagine these top 25-50 colleges enabling research in India, in partnership with both corporate and defence support. This could definitely be a long term game changer.

We still have two decade full of youngsters who will need serious jobs!